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Six months
passed since our elopement. Missing my family, I sent a letter to my sister and
brother about my whereabouts and my new life. I wrote to them saying that I
would really wish to see them and asked them to visit me. A reply came saying
the entire family would come. I was a bit
nervous, for it had been months since we have communicated. I have forgotten
to mention that Bluebeard gave me two things under my custody on the day after
our wedding. One of them was a tiny pewter key, which I wore around my neck on
a silver chain. The other was a black lacquered comb. He told me that both of
these belonged to his mother. The key he told me opens a certain door in the
mansion, which was never to be opened. I rose up early
the morning I planned to announce my family’s visit. With Bluebeard’s comb in
my hair and his key around my neck, I wore my favourite dress and met him in
the dining room. “I was
wondering, my lord,” I inquired, “If it is well with you that I have m…

[I] My
story begins with a grim prophecy that my mother told me when I was eight years
old: that I would undergo much hardship. Years later when I recalled the
prophecy, I asked her what that meant. She would tell me she had no recollection
of telling me such a depressing thing – and so it was forgotten. When
I turned 20, I met a merchant who came to our village to trade with us. He was
tall man, with rugged good looks. His hair was black and he had a beard that
appeared blue in the light. We all called him “Bluebeard” for that was what his
name was. One
day, Bluebeard approached me asking for my hand in marriage. Without discussing
the matter with my family I immediately agreed, for I yearned to leave the
village and see the outside world, and for the money (for my family owed a debt
to a neighbouring lord that was passed down from my grandfather). The
first person I told, however, was Ling. Ling was mortified. She communicated to
me in wri…

The Three Lives of Lady Bluebeard[Prologue] I was born into
a village where people are sometimes seen with wings. These wings or wing-like
“things” that we have sprouting from our shoulder blades are unique. No one has
the exact shade of colour or shape as anyone else. Not everyone could see these
wings, because of this they are called tamno,
which is “talents” in our people’s tongue. Each person’s talent is different.
For instance, my talent, from what I could see, has the colours of pigeon’s
wings. No one else could touch them except me. I could pluck feathers from my
own wings and, if I was at a loom, pass each feather through the loom like a
shuttle, weaving cloths of various colours, patterns, and designs. My brother,
Toki, tells me his are like dragonfly wings with thread-like mesh. When he is
working at his workshop making blueprints for furniture, his talents “unravel”;
each “strand” then of his talent laid itself out on the parchment as he wills
it. He then takes his writing ma…